One final thought on Ten Kids....

[conuly]

The decide to name their new addition "Zsa Zsa" because, you know, it's the last Z name. This is because their mother's naming scheme is devoid of all reason and sense. It is, in fact, quite possibly worse than naming all your children with the same initial, something that goes fine for the first three kids and then all goes to hell afterwards. (But then, the family in the book at least don't have to contend with both a Johanna and a Joy-Anna, much less a Jinger.)

Which is all well and good, but Zsa Zsa (short for Erzebet, which makes it, of course, yet another diminutive of Elizabeth) doesn't exactly have an easy pronunciation according to English orthography.

There's always Zsa Zsa Gabor, but would the kids have known about her? Not likely. And that baby name book doesn't come with a pronunciation guide. And yet, not one of the kids goes "Zsa Zsa? Huh? How do you say that?" when they decide upon this! No, they just go "Oh, that's cute" and move on!

There is something seriously wrong here. I know it was the end of the book, but spare a few paragraphs for them to realize they have no idea what they're calling the cat they've just named. (Whoops, spoilered again.)

Comments

[diatryma.livejournal.com]

I knew how to say Zsa Zsa before I knew how to pronounce it. That was in fourth grade or so, so if one of the older kids-- they go up to teenagers, right?-- read it, it can be handwaved.

[diatryma.livejournal.com]

Spell, not pronounce, sigh.

[sayga.livejournal.com]

I didn't recognize the title of the book, and then I was wondering what naming scheme the mom used because I'm insanely curious and you didn't really specify. After I read a summary of the book, it all came back to me! I don't remember how old I was, but I definitely read that book when I was a kid.

[conuly]

Now the nieces want me to read them the sequel too. Every day Evangeline asks when I'm getting a new copy of it. I'm like "Look, it's out of print. OUT. OF. PRINT. Do you know what that means? No, I know you don't, you're only five. YOU HAVE TO WAIT UNTIL I GET PAID."

[sayga.livejournal.com]

I just got a great kids' book I used to read as a kid online from England. It's been out of print for years and our copy was read until it was dead, so it was so great to see a copy and read it again. It is The Patchwork Cat by Nicola Bayley and William Mayne, because I'm sure you're wondering. It was funny reading it again though because there's a part that was totally normal to me when I was little and living in England, but when I saw the book again last month, I was kind of shocked. The cat is worrying that she will meet "a cruel dog or bitch." I took a minute to explain to Kira what the word bitch is and why it's not a nice thing to call someone.

[conuly]

LOL. L. M. Montgomery likes saying "so-and-so ejaculated" or that such-and-fuch a thing was "queer" or "feeling queer". I judiciously edited all the "ejaculateds" out for something that sounds, well, normal ("threw out" calques it nicely, but mostly I said "exclaimed") and explained "queer" twice but mostly... edited it to "strange". *I* felt strange saying either of them that often!

[eofs.livejournal.com]

I had vivid childhood memories from when I was... maybe 10 or so. I had obviously picked up the word queer somewhere (most likely a book) and used it extensively. This lead to frustrating arguments with my older brother who tried to tell me that I mustn't use that word and that it didn't mean what I thought it did. We were both so sure we were right (in a sense, we both were) that nobody was ever going to win. I presume he felt that he couldn't explain to me what he thought queer meant.

[diatryma.livejournal.com]

I have had that argument with my mother. A lot, sometimes.

[eofs.livejournal.com]

Have you at least explained to her what the current most-used meaning is? Because that was the problem between me and my brother - he was telling me I was wrong, but not what the 'right' meaning was. And since I was perfectly capable of reading a dictionary I knew I was already right.